Merchant ships rescued 46 people from a sinking fishing boat off Alaska's Aleutian Islands in the Bering Sea on Tuesday.
When the 220-foot Alaska Juris started taking on water, crewmembers radioed the Coast Guard for help and abandoned the ship, getting on three rafts,
The Associated Press reported.
The Good Samaritan ships Spar Canis and the Vienna Express and two other ships responded to a Coast Guard emergency alert. The Coast Guard also dispatched the cutter Midgett, two C-130 transport planes, and two helicopters to the scene.
Seas were calm, and no injuries were reported.
The incident occurred about 700 miles off the Alaskan coast and 150 miles northwest of Adak Island. Spar Canis recovered 28 people from two rafts and the Vienna Express rescued another 18 from a third raft.
"The crew of the Alaska Juris did the right thing by calling for help, putting on their immersion suits and safely abandoning the ship," said Lt. Greg Isbell, District 17 command duty officer,
according to a U.S. Coast Guard statement. "Emergencies can occur at any time in Alaska's vast and extreme environment, and the good Samaritans' willingness to respond to the UMIB was paramount to getting the Alaska Juris crew to safety."
The cause of the ship's taking on water hasn't been identified, but preliminary review suggests mechanical problems in the ship's engine room were at play,
The Alaska Dispatch News reported.
Karena Adler owned the boat before she died in January. She also owned the Fishing Co. of Alaska of Renton, Washington. Five people died in 2008 when the company's Alaska Ranger sank. The Coast Guard found in 2011 that the company failed to properly maintain the boat.
In 2012, a man was killed on the Alaska Juris when a cable snapped and hit him in the head. Another man was injured in a similar accident days later.
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